Poor Jenny, Bright As A Penny
- Автор: Мерфи Ширли Руссо
- Язык: английский
- Год: Ad Stellae Books
- Жанр: Фэнтези
Электронная книга - «Poor Jenny, Bright As A Penny». Краткое содержание книги:
Georgie finished layering the lasagna, put the casserole in the oven, and thought about the box of clothes she had left in Jenny’s closet. They were some outgrown things of Carol’s and Barbara’s for Jenny to go through in case she wanted any. “I hope she doesn’t think that’s charity,” Georgie said to the cat.
Jenny loved her room. There were two deep dormer windows, one with a cushioned seat built into it and one that held a desk. From both she could look at the tops of trees and the roofs of houses that wandered down the hill beyond to the city. When she turned back to the room it seemed to welcome her.
The bedspread had orange and yellow flowers, and the walls were yellow. Tall bookcases stood on either side of the bed and in them were books she knew and loved and others she did not know. The desk was painted blue. On it was a typewriter, a new yellow blotter, and a stack of clean paper.
The closet doors were covered with painted bulletin boards; she could see generations of thumbtack holes and faded squares where another girl had kept her treasures. This had been Carol’s room. The dresser was painted bright orange and there were pictures of birds hanging beside it. What was Carol like? She was married now. This was an old house, generations of girls must have dreamed in this room and planned their lives here. Jenny could see them around her like bright ghosts. Carol had dark hair like her own. Jenny could imagine a little girl with long dark braids dressed in a white slip kneeling on the window seat watching the afternoon shadows on the rooftops, she could see her curled in the window seat with a book in her lap, or a Carol Jenny’s age dressing for a party. She could almost see her reflection in the mirror behind her own. She could imagine other vague reflections then, girls who were already grown and married when it was Carol’s room.
Jenny’s reflection, framed by those bright ghosts, looked like a beggar in rags. A shabby, faded girl who did not belong there. Her wrinkled gray sweater and skirt made her hair look stringier; she looked like the girls she had seen shopping for clothes at the Salvation Army. She hated the way she looked, she hated her worn, faded clothes.
She attacked the box in the closet desperately; a red plaid dress lay on top. She pulled the box out into the room and began to lift out dresses, skirts, and sweaters. They were bright, they were riches that she needed. She hadn’t known how much she needed them.
She spread the beautiful clothes across the bed, and began to try them on. She posed before the mirror in the plaid dress. Then she scowled at her hair and snatched at it impatiently.
In the bottom of the box was a red turtle-neck sweater with a matching cap. She tried the cap on, then took it off and tied her hair into a pony tail, put on lipstick, and tilted the cap over one eye. She looked away from the mirror, then looked quickly back. And she saw Crystal. At least she saw something of Crystal; she opened her brown eyes wider and tried Crystal’s smile.
She stood in front of the mirror for a long time, practicing Crystal’s smile.
Then she tried on all the clothes again, one after the other. She felt greedy and wonderful. She put on the blue skirt and the red turtle-neck sweater, found her hairbrush, and began to transform her hair.
When she had finished, it was coiled on top of her head. She stood with her chin lifted, looking at herself sideways, and tried Crystal’s smile again. It came easily now. She was new. She was someone new. The colors of the room shone around her, the solid, beautiful furniture. Now it was truly her room. She pretended that she had always lived in this house, had sat upon that window seat when she was small and watched the city change from winter white to springtime—her childhood memories were all of this place, memories of light and laughter running through this house and this garden like wisps of sun-laden wind.
She smiled into the mirror. She was a grown-up Jenny in her own home, smiling into a mirror she had smiled into ever since she had been old enough to stand on tiptoe. She gave the mirror an amused, haughty look. Then she stared hard at herself and she saw the old comfortable Jenny once more, and she grinned. That was friendlier.
*
Bingo felt like a happy animal come home to its cave; his room was like a cave. It had three book-lined walls and the fourth wall was open to the world with windows from floor to ceiling. He could look down on rooftops, and beyond them to the city and the river. He could see the old apartment house they had lived in. It now looked like a tiny brick model. He thought of the evening that he and Jenny had stood in the snow and looked in the lighted windows of houses like this one. It made him feel strange. Here they were just as they had wished.
Bingo’s bed had a blue spread and when he first entered, there was a yellow cat asleep on it. Mrs. Dermody said his name was Sam. Bingo had petted him gently, but the cat slept so soundly that finally Bingo left him. Sam, in his own good time, woke and came to sit on Bingo’s desk where now he washed his face and observed Bingo closely. When Bingo petted him, he purred.
The red trunk stood at the foot of Bingo’s bed. He took out Papa’s books and stood them in a row on the desk. They seemed at home there. Sam smelled them with interest. “What do you smell?” Bingo asked.
Sam answered with a soft, singing mew.
“Maybe you’ll sleep on my bed tonight. I’ve never had a cat to sleep with.” Sam yawned and curled up under Bingo’s hand.
Jenny found them there, snug and happy. “How can you sit here with that wonderful smell? Do you think it’s spaghetti?”
Bingo sniffed. It smelled delicious. Then he looked at Jenny and whistled.
“You look terrific. What have you done?”
“It’s the sweater. Mrs. Dermody gave it to me.”
“But it’s your hair too. It—it’s like Crystal’s.”
“Don’t you like it?”
“It—” He studied her through his thick-rimmed glasses as he might study a piece of architecture. “Yes, as long as you’re the same inside.”
“I’m the same inside.” They pelted down the stairs with Sam at their heels, and laid the table for Georgie. At dinner they sat silent and uncomfortable under the eyes of the two Dermody men.
They were never uncomfortable around Lud. But then, no matter what your manners were or what you said, it didn’t matter with Lud. Here, even though they ate in the kitchen with the cats sleeping on an empty chair and the police radio going, Jenny and Bingo were as stiff as two boards.
*
It is Friday and our first night at the Dermodys. We had lasagna for dinner. It’s better even than spaghetti. We ate as slowly as we could and still it seemed to me we were wolfing it. Why do Jack and Ben Dermody make me feel so uncomfortable? Jack said that we should call them by their first names, that when people live together it’s silly to use last names. Tonight he had on faded Levi’s and an old shirt instead of his uniform, and that was better, but still he makes me a little uneasy. It’s as if he watches and watches you, as if everything you say becomes recorded forever in his mind like in a computer. It makes me feel very clumsy. I guess that’s part of being a cop, though. And maybe they see such a lot of horrible crimes, that their faces grow to be hard like that.
Jack gave me the biggest piece of pie. He said I needed fattening up, but he didn’t make me feel skinny and ugly, the way he said it. If I eat like that every day it’s bound to do something for my shape. I hope it all goes in the right places.
Ben Dermody is handsome and he knows it. At least it seemed to me he couldn’t be bothered talking to us.